
Meet Max Sparber
Max Sparber is an arts editor for MPR News.
Max started as an arts critic and editor at WMMR radio, the now-defunct college radio station at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities. He has also worked as an arts reporter and editor at KFAI, City Pages, The Omaha Reader and American Jewish World, and freelanced for a variety of publications, including The Guardian and the Minnesota Star Tribune.
Max’s work has received several awards and accolades, including two Page One Awards from the Minnesota Society of Professional Journalists for arts criticism, an Eric Sevareid Award from the Midwest Broadcast Journalists Association and a Premack Public Affairs Journalism Award.
Max attended the University of Minnesota Twin Cities and has completed certificate programs in the arts from Harvard and Yale, as well as a certificate program in editing from Poynter. He is also an author, poet and playwright.
Max is a second-generation MPR employee. His biological mother edited the MPR publication that eventually became Minnesota Monthly in the 1970s. He is a big fan of Chicago mix popcorn, which, despite its name, is a Minnesota invention.
You can find Max Sparber on LinkedIn.
Recent Contributions
- MN Shortlist, April 3–9: Artists rethink how stories are carried
- MN Shortlist, March 27-April 2: Art as record, witness and repair
- MN Shortlist, March 20–26: Crossing forms, holding histories
- MN Shortlist, March 13–19: Films in Ely, orchestral favorites and a shamrock-themed rock lineup
- MN Shortlist, March 6–12: From Cuban cinema to circus spectacle
- MN Shortlist, April 27 – March 5: Winter pushback, origin stories and returns
- MN Shortlist, Feb. 20-26: Comedy lifers, lethal manners and borrowed time
- MN Shortlist, Feb. 13–19: Love songs, hard truths and a long winter
- MN Shortlist, Feb. 6-12: Systems under pressure, repetition and the art of consequence
- MN Shortlist, Jan. 30–Feb. 5: New dance, live music and cozy getaways
